The times may be a-changin’, but London is still largely run by white men, a new study has found.

Not one visible minority can be found in the 15 top-paying city of London management positions, according to the study conducted by Western University researchers in partnership with Pillar Nonprofit Network.

And when it comes to gender balance, the city doesn’t fare much better — with only 21 per cent of senior manager roles filled by women.

“I don’t think I expected the findings would be quite so severe,” said Victoria Esses, co-author of the study and a professor at Western University’s Centre for Research on Migration and Ethnic Relations.

“It’s not like London had no diversity up until two years ago.... In recent years there is a decent level of diversity in London, and to have really poor representation in the municipal public sector is not that great.”

Finding 21 per cent of (white) women in leadership positions is nothing to cheer about either, she said.

“It doesn’t mean it’s fine, but it perhaps means that women are starting to catch up.”

Women account for about half London’s population.

“It is very important to have decision makers represent the population they serve,” Esses said. “These are the people who are making decisions about our community and how our community operates. Not having the voices of visible minorities or visible minority women means decisions that could be biased against them might be made because different positions aren’t considered,” she said.

“I’m not saying white men are biased or going to make bad decisions but a (homogeneous group) is going to be less likely to take into account the perspectives of everybody.”

The study did not look at elected officials. It aimed to explore the makeup of leadership on boards, commissions and in the non-profit, education and municipal public sectors — including police and fire chiefs. More than 2,400 leaders were analyzed for visible minority status and gender in London, Ottawa and Hamilton that considered medium-sized cities.

Visible minorities, especially non-white women, were underrepresented almost across the board in London and Ottawa.

“I wasn’t really surprised by these results. It validates what I see,” said Dharshi Lacey of Pillar Nonprofit Network that commissioned the study.

Pillar is an agency that supports the city’s nonprofit organizations. The study is part of Pillar’s DiverseCity Onboard program that helps match qualified diverse candidates with nonprofit boards who have had challenges recruiting non-white members.

“When I do outreach presentations it’s clear to me the board tables are not diverse for the most part.”

Lacey said the new data.

The study found nonprofit boards of directors are overwhelmingly white, with only about five per cent of members being visible minorities, proving the need for programs that go beyond the traditional recruitment process, she said.

“While we have a certain level of diversity in our community, that’s not being seen at decision-making tables, and if we really are being responsive to the community, that leadership needs to be reflected at those tables.”

Lacey said she has helped match 30 diverse candidates with boards since August 2015.

Coun. Harold Usher has been pushing the city to become more reflective of an increasingly multicultural oopulation for more than a decade, but said he’s seen little change in the corridors of city hall.

“If you don’t have the qualifications you’re out, I don’t care who you are. I don’t like the word quota, but I think what we need to do is have a staff that is closely representative of the community we serve,” he said. “ As an organization of the city of London, we owe it to the community to represent who they are.”

Usher said he is optimistic about the recent hiring of diversity consultant Saleha Khan in the human resources department.

“I’m looking forward now that they have this new person it’s going to make a difference,” he said.

The study found visible minorities make up 7.9 per cent of the municipal, public and non-profit leadership positions, which is a low percentage, considering they made up at least 13.1 per cent of London’s population in 2011 — a ratio that has likely increased — according to the most recently available data from Statistics Canada.

“I don’t think (the numbers) are all that surprising,” said Shawna Lewkowitz, chair of London’s diversity, inclusion and anti-oppression committee. “It’s an example of systemic racism. To deny that it is systemic racism is to say there aren’t qualified candidates who are visible minorities in our community. Systemic racism isn’t intentional, it means we are just doing the things the way we always do which maintains the status quo.”

She said the data will help provide a baseline to look back on in a few years and measure progress with diversity

Ottawa has a similarly low ratio of visible minorities in leadership positions, but in Hamilton, nearly 14 per cent of leaders are visible minorities, close to the same percentage that make up the population of that city.

In London visible minority women are “severely underrepresented,” among senior leaders in the non-profit and municipal sectors, the study found. They filled only three per cent of the leadership roles in the community, despite making up nearly seven per cent of the population.

At the provincial level, visible minorities and female visible minorities were also underrepresented in agencies, boards and commissions, the study found.

One notable area where diversity is more reflective in London leadership is in the non-profit post-secondary education sector, where more than 13 per cent of senior managers are visible minorities.

“It’s the voluntary and education sectors that are doing better,” said Esses. “Women are better represented in those sectors, but when you break it down, particularly the municipal public sector, it doesn’t look that great.”

Mayor Matt Brown was in Ottawa Tuesday night, and responded to the results of the study with the following email statement:

"These studies are important. It's clear to me that we need to work towards developing a team that better reflects our makeup as a city. It's also clear from reviewing the survey results that we're not alone, but there is no reason we can't lead. It's important for Londoners to see people from all walks of life represented within the City of London."